Keeping Bees Since the Eruption<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Since you found the burst of fireweed
\nwhere the scorched bear plied the chomping brook,
\nsaw crimson blooms squeeze through rent cedar,
\ntold the ladies there are flowers
\ntasseling for the rest of their lives,
\nbore them up St. Helens\u2019 spine,
\nfaced their doors toward morning sun
\nwhere guard bees wing the gray mist fleeing,
\nfelt the singe of venom in your veins, imagined
\nfresh comb full-capped, plugged with honey,
\ninterred the dead in ash, and set
\nher white mansions where earth fell apart\u2014
\nyou can wait with them for the dawn.<\/p>\n
Since you were stung in the night, <\/p>\n “Keeping Bees Since the Eruption” is reprinted from North American Review.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n D.C. Miller<\/a> stumbles up to alpine country regularly, guides ocean kayakers to the B.C. coast, and sorely tries to avoid the ER, from close encounters with the teeth of his Great Pyrenees dog.\u00a0 Although his commercial beekeeping days are over, he continues to urge small females to fly into his heirloom apples to lick flowers. When not writing, you can find him tethered to \u201cBarkley\u201d, dragged to new heights in the Columbia Gorge &\u00a0 North Cascades. \u00a0He lives in White Salmon.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Keeping Bees Since the Eruption Since you found the burst of fireweed where the scorched bear plied the chomping brook, saw crimson blooms squeeze through rent cedar, told the ladies there are flowers tasseling for the rest of their … Continue reading
\neach sting union and requiem\u2014
\nyou feel the earth\u2019s spin,
\nunderstand the dance of bees.
\nYou sense in every Apis mellifera<\/em>
\nrenewal and matriarch,
\nand when you push your way
\nthrough cheek-high flowers, the bees,
\na galaxy of copper stars with frail wings,
\nthe swarm is ether, zuzzing a new skyline.<\/p>\n